Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this motion and thank my colleagues for tabling it. I also thank the Government for accepting it. Every time a Government Minister comments about An Post, he or she makes the point that it is a commercial semi-State company with a mandate to act commercially and that it has statutory responsibility for the State's postal service and post office network. That statutory role needs to change and must incorporate an offline avenue for all government services. The post office network is the only State-controlled network with a footprint across the country to provide such a service. Since the emergence of Covid-19 in March 2020, access to many government services has been restricted for those who do not want to or cannot use the online digital options. Throughout the pandemic, our post office network remained open.

It is long-standing Government policy that postal services are not directly subsidised but no one is asking for that. The Government has, in fairness, been focused on supporting An Post in the roll-out of new services and in the delivery of the strategic plan. However, part of the agreement regarding voluntary closures that was made with postmasters in April 2018 was that a subsidy would be put in place over a three-year period to allow An Post to put new and additional services into the post office network and that the State would roll out services across the network. No State services have been provided in the past three years and the Government is now looking at the feasibility of directing services to the post office. We have seen during the pandemic the important role that the post offices have played. We have also seen the potential of An Post to develop new services and yet here we are, still talking about the feasibility of it.

In January of this year, the Tánaiste published Ireland's national remote working strategy. One of its objectives was to provide a permanent option after the pandemic for 20% of Government and public sector employees to work from home by the end of 2021. How in God's name can that happen if we are still operating counter services and paper forms that must be physically inputted? We can provide that service if the post office network becomes the offline option for front-of-office government services. We can provide that option for many more public services.

The difficulty is that the online service does not work for everyone. I will give one practical example. You cannot renew your motor tax online unless you have an email address. There are hundreds and thousands of people across this country who do not have an email address. Should they be excluded from government services because they do not have an email address or cannot use the technology? The reality is that taking services offline and directing them through the post office network would eliminate costly, paper-based notices and transactions. I have outlined this in detail in a case study relating to the roll-out of the property tax. We need decisive action from the Government to support rural communities, vulnerable people and our vital post office network.

The Government published a report on the provision of offline government services on foot of an interdepartmental group that was established in 2018. The report was produced in 2019. Lo and behold, at the end of the process, the conclusion was to set up another interdepartmental group to look at the issue. Why is the support of our post offices always just one report away from action? The reality is that such a policy approach was taken prior to my appointment as Minister for Communications, Climate Action and the Environment and it nearly led to the collapse of the post office network and the company as a whole. Yet here we are failing to learn from the mistakes of the past, continuing the political dithering on this matter. We need urgent action. We are committed to bringing this matter back to the House again and again until we see action to support this vital network across rural and urban Ireland.

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